Don’t say we didn’t warn you: you may already know that Martin Hansson of Sweden (the ref who missed the Thierry Henry handball) is on the official refs list for the World Cup Finals, but after watching Roberto Rossetti of Italy referee the Bayern Munich v Lyon Champions League semi final this evening, he may be one that England may need to keep an eye on. Two red cards: a justifiable straight one for Bayern’s Frank Ribery but worryingly a second yellow for Jeremy Toulalan of Lyon – for the type of challenge that goes unpunished in football matches up and down the UK.

Thierry Henry has escaped any kind of censure from FIFA over the handball incident against Ireland last year, in much the same way as Diego Maradona did in 1986. The statement that FIFA issued is interesting though – the bold text has been added by us:

“On 2 December 2009, the FIFA Executive Committee asked the FIFA Disciplinary Committee to analyse the handling offence committed by Thierry Henry during the France v. Republic of Ireland match on 18 November 2009, and to consider the possible disciplinary consequences.

“At its meeting on 18 January 2010, the Disciplinary Committee reached the conclusion that there was no legal foundation for the committee to consider the case because handling the ball cannot be regarded as a serious infringement as stipulated in article 77a) of the FIFA DisciplinaryCode.Â There is no other legal text that would allow the committee to impose sanctions for any incidents missed by match officials.”

In case you were wondering (and we know you were), here’s article 77 for you:

So now you know. A deliberate handball in the act of scoring a goal that is missed by the refereeÂ is not a serious enough infringement for the FIFA Disciplinary Committee to look at it retrospectively. The lastÂ sentence in the statement is interesting as it seems to implyÂ that the FIFA lawyers have had to look at it. You know, just in case any parties that might have had a grievance felt like taking the matter to the next level.

The second incident is reminiscent of what happened at the World Cup in Spain in 1982. Austria and West Germany knew they only had to draw in order for both to qualify for the second round at the expense of Algeria; so it should not have come as a massive surprise that the game – whichÂ as much fun as watching paint dry by all accounts -Â endedÂ 0-0. Since then, the last group games in major international tournaments have kicked of simultaneously in order to prevent that happening again.

Or at least that was how it was supposed to work. On Monday – with both teams knowing in advance that a draw would do – Algeria drew 0-0 with Angola and both qualified for the quarter finals of the African CupÂ of NationsÂ at Mali’s expense; Mali have launched an official complaint to the CAFÂ about the game.

Hopefully we won’t get any outrageous decisions or games like those mentioned above this summer, but don’t be too shocked if we do. Let’s just hope England aren’t involved in any of them.

First of all, apologies – some peculiar technical glitches with my internet connectionÂ (who knew that ‘the internets’ could get blown around by high winds) and my laptop (which desperately needs a new fan), it’s not been possible to post anything for a week or so. Everything seems to be working at the moment, so here’s a new post.

A quick summary of yesterdayâ€™s FIFA emergency general meeting: there will no changes in the amount of match officials and Thierry Henry will be â€˜investigatedâ€™.

That’s it. I hope lunch was a good one.

More importantly, the seeding system for tomorrow’s draw were announced andÂ are as follows:

According to the latest FIFA rankings, five of the teams in Pot 4, half of the teams in Pot 2 and two of the teams in Pot 3 are in the top 20. Despite qualifying via the playoffs, France and Portugal are currently ranked higher than we are (whichÂ may see one ofÂ themÂ drawn in South Africaâ€™s group)

Another thing worth rememberingÂ is that as the South American qualifiers have already played each other during their continental qualifying competition, it is highly unlikely that theyâ€™ll be drawn against each other. Iâ€™d also be surprised if South Africa are drawn against another African nation.

There’s been a lot of speculation in today’s press regarding possible opponents for EnglandÂ but I’m not going to waste time on that; here’s a list ofÂ qualifying nationsÂ we’ve never played: Algeria, Ghana, Honduras, North Korea, the Ivory CoastÂ and Serbia. I really hope we avoid the last two in the group stages – both of them are potential quarter finalists. Another fact to amaze your friends: we have not played a competitive game against Chile since the notorious 1950 World Cup campaign when we lost to the USA.

All being well we’ll be covering the draw live via theÂ 11lionslive tab above. The draw will be covered on BBC2 starting at 5:15pm GMT and – apparently for the first time – live on ESPN atÂ 12.oopm EST.

So in less than 24 hours we’ll know our opponents and millions of stickers, wall charts and previews will be keeping printing presses busy across the world…hooray!

The announcement today that Sepp Blatter has called an extraordinary general meeting of FIFA in Cape Town two days before the draw for the finals seems to be a classic case of shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted. The rather terse statement on FIFA.com runs as follows:

‘Due to recent events in the world of football, namely incidents at the play-offs for the 2010 FIFA World Cup South Africaâ„¢, match control (refereeing) and irregularities in the football betting market, the FIFA President has called an extraordinary meeting of the Executive Committee.’

OK, let’s go through this point by point. Presumably the ‘incidents’ include the stoning of the Algerian bus in Cairo before their playoff with Egypt, ‘match control’ must refer to Thierry Henry’s ‘goal’ versus Ireland and the ‘irregularities in the football betting market’ refers to the wave of arrests that have taken place in continental Europe over the past week or so. The first one is a World Cup issue and a World Cup connection is implied within the second issueÂ so we’ll deal with them here: we’ll probably only discuss the third if it somehow becomes relevent to next summer.

The date of the meetingÂ automatically rules out the prospect of some kind of Ireland v France rematch, but – as has been suggested elsewhere – it may mean that the experiment with two extra officials patrolling the goal lines that is taking part in the Europa League this season may be permanent next summer. If – and it’s a big if – the extra official had seen Henry’s handball, then the goal might not have been allowed; it remains to be seen if video technology might be considered, but when one of the corporateÂ ‘partners’ is one of the world’s largest electronic manufacturers…well you get the picture. In HD where possible.

The bus stoning incident in Cairo was a pretty nasty one and both sides have blamed each other for it, but it was not the only problem during the qualifiers and certainly isn’t the first time that there’s been crowd trouble in Africa during qualifying competitions. Closer to home,Â Â the Serbian FA were fined Â£26,700 (approximately $45,000 or 29,500 or so Euros) for trouble caused by their fans during their qualifiers and elements of our lunatic fringe will try their best to cause problems next summer. Apparently ‘street’ drinking is illegal in South Africa even though it is felt that the local police will ignore it for the duration of the finals; a horde of rampaging hooligansÂ (or what might appear to be rampaging hooligans)Â in the middle of a country with an undeniablyÂ serious crime problem could be potentially catastrophic.

I really don’t want to come across as the voice of doom and I’d really like to think that the FIFA meeting might result in something positive, but quite what they’re going to do about an international superstar breaking Law 12 and getting away with it or how they expect to stop hooliganism by raising fines against national football associations is beyond me. Let’s see what they come up with…but don’t hold your breath.